What if travel becomes addictive?

There are many addictions. There are many habits we tend to rely on. And we want those habits to make part of our daily lives, otherwise we feel threatened, we feel someone is taking our great mind’s comfort away. We experience it at many different levels and with several things. Food, caffeine, cigarettes and alcohol, sports, music, relationships, religion, ideology and the list continues. I’ve just realized how easily we can be addicted to travel too. Travelling is a beautiful addiction but it can also be… challenging.

We like the beginning of a new chapter and we enjoy the freshness of the new perspective which is what travel is all about. We reach different places every day, we meet people randomly on the street and we come across unknown situations all the time. It minors our ego and increases our levels of adrenaline and that’s why we end up by being addicted.

If someone tells us that we are escaping from something, we most likely react to it and feel touched by that assumption. But if we think clearly, and give it some time to digest the statement, we are actually doing everything but not escaping. How can we be escaping from our life and ourselves if we are in constant need of fully presence and awareness? How can we be escaping from ourselves if we chose us to be our full-time company? And how can we be running away if we are actually in the need of taking serious and spontaneous decisions that really depends upon our clear state of consciousness and our inner-speech and self-reflection? Travelling is, instead, a very intentional meeting with ourselves. Think about it.

We are all sensation seekers. At different levels, of course. We can be looking for tick off a list of monuments and historical must sees, we can be hankering after laid-back days at the beach while drinking cocktails and eating local food, we can be into volunteering, animals rescue and farming work, we can be looking for spectacular and intense experiences so that we get to document and photograph them, we can be on a spiritual journey, choosing to learn more about meditation and yoga, we can be willing to spend time with ourselves and give it the opportunity to have creative ideas that will be useful for our future jobs, we can be looking for a place where to spend a year, alone, or we can be willing to do villages hopping, in a very jumpy and detached way.

Aren’t we all sensation seekers, anyways? And isn’t it becoming something we don’t want to stop because it feels good and enriches us so much? To take the most out of our lives, there is this very precious big thing called ‘balance’. But how can we balance a life of stability and travel, of routine and randomness, of control and spontaneity? Here are my tips, which I hope can serve us all in this beautiful attempt of taking the best out of this life:

Find a profession where you can work remotely

(If 1 doesn’t work) Find a job where you are able to work seasonally

(If 1 and 2 don’t work) Find a boss that comprehends your needs and is easy-going with dates

Make an annual plan, save money and spend your holidays travelling

Integrate your travels on your personal and professional CV

Travel throughout your own country and act like a traveller in your own town

Make a monthly list with the positive effects of travelling on yourself

Fill a piggy bank with the money of beer and clothes and book a flight

Always think twice before putting life changing opportunities under a status

Once in a while, book last minute flights on the weekends and go somewhere

Be surrounded by people who remind you how good is to be an explorer

Wait for my next post which is all about how to travel on very low-budget, because… the less you spend, the longer you stay on the road. And, who told you travelling can’t be your career itself?

Where do I want to get with this post? Far enough to make you recognise this little bug that has bitten you before. It will always be itchy, especially if you decided to settle your life again and keep it that way for a long period. It will be way to itchy to bear. So, read and reflect on those paramaters and see if they make sense to you.I love how Bill Bryson puts it into words: “To my mind, the greatest reward and luxury of travel is to be able to experience everyday things as if for the first time, to be in a position in which almost nothing is so familiar it is taken for granted”.

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27 years ago I was born in Portugal. Soon I realized I was addicted to movement, nature, diversity and the narrative of the World. I love living to tell and I actually travel to live. After an intense journey of 8 months throughout Asia, I am now getting ready for a season in the Alps.